The so-called ‘Machine to Machine’ (hereinafter M2M) concept envisions a networked interconnection of common objects, which could be equipped with minuscule identifying devices, be interoperable and also be enabled to act independently, pursuing their own objectives or shared ones, and depending on context, circumstances or environments. In this respect, power meters, vehicles and even orange trees can be enabled to report their status over the network, and thus the M2M is expected to grow encompassing 16 billion connectable devices worldwide by year 2020.
A particular technical field within the M2M is the one known as “Connected Consumer Electronics” (CCE), which is mainly focusing on how electronic appliances intended for everyday use are connected and inter-work with users and other devices. These CCE devices, hereinafter appliances, are associated to a M2M connection which can be used to upload/download information to/from network-hosted sites, sometimes operated by telecommunication operators and some times by third parties. Exemplary CCE devices, namely appliances, may be photo cameras or media readers for uploading pictures from an ACME camera to the ACME Media Store, via an M2M connection.
New services are desirable in these scenarios where pluralities of appliances are enabled to connect with each other and to interoperate with telecommunication networks and third party sites. For example, in the above exemplary use case, a user owning the ACME camera might also be enabled to connect with the ACME Media Store by other means, such as via his/her PC, and might even want to charge the picture upload/download service to a billing account associated with another of his devices, such as his mobile phone, or vice verse.
At present, a user Bob may be represented by different identifiers which are respectively relevant for entities involved in particular domains. For example, the user Bob may be identified in the ACME Media Store by a username and password, whereas any appliance owned by Bob and equipped with a SIM card of the telecommunication network may be identified by an MSISDN.
Next generations of M2M-related architectures are expected to allow seamless interactions between multiple devices over multiple channels. However, conventional architectures nowadays still handle this variety of appliances, such as mobile phones, TV, sensors, cameras, etc, in silos. That is, interactions between appliances are still treated as occurring in different domains not interacting with each other.
As exploring appliances which can be more easily connected with each other, one can realize that those appliances equipped with a SIM card of a telecommunication network may more easily be associated with each other in said telecommunication network. To this end, the user should be given the possibility to choose one particular operator when purchasing the appliance and the seller should have the possibility to offer different choices to the user. Then, the association itself might be offered by the operators via provisioning systems. However, quite a few drawbacks exist for this quasi-manual procedure where human intervention is required. For example, there is a technical complexity since shops must have a connection with operators of the telecommunication network and such connection requires the management of network credentials. Apart from that, this solution does not solve the problem of associations at the ACME Media Store.
Moreover, the variety of appliances under consideration is not expected to have a powerful user interface but rather a limited one, at least, generally speaking. That is, a feasible solution should not come across an extensive user interaction through the appliance.
On the other hand, in the above situations, the user Bob would have to (re)-identify himself as “Bob” for every interaction through different appliances or devices, and could also need to authenticate from each of the appliances or devices. This could be complex for devices with a limited user interface, such as a camera might have.
There is thus a need for providing a consistent user experience independently on the appliance or device, and independently of the type of access, that Bob is making use of That is, “Bob” should always be “Bob” towards the ACME Media Store, and independently on whether it is Bob from his camera, Bob from his PC or Bob from his phone.